263 (#343) ############################################ COLOURED YARN PRODUCTION the woollen industry for fancy goods, i.e. where piece- dyeing is not admissible, but it is rarely employed in the worsted industry-probably because the “felting” which results from dyeing loose wool would result in such a poor" tearage”-obviously the“ straightening” which follows from combing prevents felting. Note should now be made that there are three types of coloured yarns in everyday use, viz.- (a) Solids; (6) Mixtures (fibre and melange); (c) Twists. The production of solid coloured yarns will be well realized from the foregoing, but mixtures and twists must be further considered. Mixtures (6) may be almost solid colours with a "cast"; or true mixtures in which very different colours are blended together to give a fine spreckled appear- ance, which appearance, of course, merges into a solid colour some little distance away. In woollen and worsted yarns the mixture effect is most frequently due to differently coloured fibres Woollen mixtures being produced by mixing two or more differently dyed wools together in the fibre form, thus resulting in a fibre-mixture yarn; and Worsted mixtures being produced by mixing two or more differently dyed slubbings (i.e. tops) together, thus resulting in a fibre-mixture yarn. Given level, fast dyeing, in both cases there only remains the mixing, which must be most perfectly effected if level pieces are to be produced from these yarns. With worsted yarns-usually longer fibred than woollen yarns the difficulties of producing regular mixings are so great that sometimes mixing on the comb is resorted to notwithstanding the possibilities 263